Ryoko's Profiles: Washu
By BGlanders

*****

It's easy to blame others for all the bad things in life.  When I think of all
the crap that's happened to me, all the torture and pain Kagato subjected me
to, I think back to the cause of it all; mom.

     I know she's my biological mother, but that doesn't mean I have to love
her or any sentimental crap like that.  She doesn't care about things like
feelings, just theories.  She cares about test tubes and experiments, not
about life or love.  That little red-haired demon is the cause of all the
heartache and woe that has afflicted me in life, and after 5,000 years, that's
a lot of woe.

     She's listening, even now.  I can't stand that she can see and hear every
little thought I have.  She's always there, probing the back of my mind and
looking for something new and 'interesting' for some damn test of hers.
Sometimes I think I'd prefer Kagato to come back and control me flat out.  At
least that's something that I can recognize and fight, but Washu... She can
peer into my soul and I can't do anything about it.  It's like mental rape;
she can invade my deepest thoughts and exploit them for her own personal gain.
That violation, that quiet, unnoticable violation hurts me more than any test
that bastard Kagato could have preformed.

     Sometimes she almost sounds like a mom.  When I was in that vial on
Clay's ship, I heard a side of her that I didn't know existed.  I wanted to
say no, to spit everything she was saying back in her face and let that Zero
bitch die.  I wanted to say no, but something in the way she asked me made me
stop and think.  It was the first time she sounded like a mother and not some
careless scientist.  It caught me off guard, made me give in.  She made me
accept something I (yes, I'll admit it) knew I needed but still didn't want.
For that, for gently forcing me to bend to her will, I hated her more than
anything.

     I've got to remember to thank Yosho for letting me borrow his word
processor to write all this down.  I never knew I was so versatile (wow, a big
word!).  It feels good to let all this out, it kinda takes some of the weight
off my shoulders.  (I swear to God, if Aeka gets a hold of any of these I'm
going to rip her throat out.)

     Back to Washu.  I think I've finally figured out why she made me in the
first place.  When we had to let little Taro go (thank God), Washu looked
almost...hurt.  She opened up to us about her own kid from way back when and
how he had been taken from her.  It was the only time she had seemed depressed
around others.  She tired to pretend like it was no big deal, but we all saw
it, we all know...

     She's always so hyper, it was a real shock to see her get emotional.
After hearing about her son, I finally figured out what I was to her; I was a
replacement.  I was supposed to fill some tiny gap that was in her soul.  All
of her studies and work, they were just her way of filling that void her son
left behind, but it wasn't enough.  I believe that if Washu hadn't lost her
child, that she wouldn't have become the greatest scientific genius in the
universe, and that maybe I wouldn't have been born either.

     I've tried to turn the tables every once in awhile, to see into her own
thoughts via our mental link, and sometimes I hit paydirt.  When she's
sleeping or too involved in her work to notice, I quietly sneak a peek and see
what's really going on in her twisted little head.  I saw her son in there, in
the far corners of her mind.  It was a faded, dusty image, like a photograph
that's been left out in the sun too long.  I couldn't even make out his face,
and I know that hurts Washu.  The greatest scientific genius in the universe
and she can't even remember her son's face, the most powerful mind in the
galaxy and she couldn't even defend her won child.  When I saw that, saw how
she felt, I felt sorry for her.  I finally realized what I had 'inherited'
from her; my solitude.  She uses her work to block out the world, I use my
toughness.  Neither one of us are good at handling emotions, neither one of us
really know how to deal with people.  We hide, whether it is behind a test
tube or a sword, he hide from how we really fell.  This is probably the only
thing we have in common (next to Tenchi, that is).  For all for these reasons,
I hate Washu more than anyone in the universe.  For all of these reasons, I
love my mother.

*****

Yeah!  All right!  I finally finished this one!!  I had to type this up three
times; first time I lost it, the second time my computer lost power and wiped
the file, the third time I saved every five seconds.  If you're really
interested, there are two other Ryoko Profiles out there.  I'm still kinda new
at this and I'm without a spell checker, so welcome to typodemon hell
(BWAHAHAHAHA).  

All Tenchi characters, events, and such belong to AIC and Pioneer.

All C&C goes to BGlanders@aol.com